HMS Fiji was the lead ship of her class of 11 light cruisers built for the Royal Navy shortly before the Second World War.

[2] The Fiji class carried enough fuel oil to give them a range of 6,520 nautical miles (12,080 km; 7,500 mi) at 13 knots (24 km/h; 15 mph).

[2] The armament of the Fiji-class ships consisted of a dozen BL 6-inch (152 mm) Mk XXIII guns in four three-gun turrets, one superfiring pair fore and aft of the superstructure.

[4] On 31 August 1940 she sailed for the African Atlantic coast to take part in Operation Menace, the attack on Dakar, but before she could join the taskforce, Fiji was damaged by a torpedo from the German submarine U-32 on 1 September and had to return to Britain for repairs, which lasted for the next six months.

The flooding gave her a list to port; to counter it the ammunition from the forward turrets was thrown overboard and the portside torpedoes were ejected over the side.

[9] British intelligence anticipated that the Germans would attack the island of Crete on 17 May and Admiral Andrew Cunningham, commander of the Mediterranean Fleet, ordered his ships to sea on the 15th.

The Germans began landing paratroopers on 20 May when Force B was en route to rendezvous with the battleships Warspite and Valiant and their escorts west of Crete.

Writing in despatches after the battle, Cunningham stated that King was unaware of the shortage of anti-aircraft ammunition in Fiji and Gloucester.

By 15:30, while attempting to rejoin Force A1, Fiji had exhausted her supply of 4-inch (102 mm) anti-aircraft ammunition and was reduced to firing practice rounds.

[14] The aerial attacks continued despite the heavy cloud cover; at 19:00 a Messerschmitt Bf 109 fighter bomber struck the cruiser amidships with a bomb.

Despite this damage Fiji was able to maintain a speed of 18 knots (33 km/h; 21 mph) until another Bf 109 hit her with another bomb that increased her list to 30 degrees.

[15] Kit Tanner, the ship's chaplain, was posthumously awarded the Albert Medal (since replaced by the George Cross) for repeatedly entering the sea to rescue men from the water.

[16] On 30 May 1941, in a letter to the First Sea Lord, Sir Dudley Pound, Cunningham wrote, "The sending back of Gloucester and Fiji to Greyhound was another grave error and cost us those two ships.